AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am Betting Preview

This week’s event on the PGA Tour is the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am, and it is one of the PGATour’s most popular events with stars of stage and screen competing alongside the pros.

The event will, as always, take place over three courses – Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill and the Shore Course at Monterey Peninsula Country Club. Players and amateurs will play each course once, before the pros take over on Sunday for the final round at Pebble Beach.

Both Pebble Beach and Spyglass Hill will play to par-72s, while the Shore Course will play to a par 70. Dustin Johnson is the defending champion, having won the last two renewals of this event.

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Wilson beats Dufner in Phoenix Open Playoff

Just a few short weeks ago, many people would have struggled to pick out Mark Wilson from a crowd. But that was before he won the Sony Open in Hawaii, and in doing so brought a two year hiatus from the winners’ enclosure to an end.

But not content with that Hawaii win, Wilson has gone on to capture the weather-hit Waste Management Phoenix Open after a closing 67 saw him in a playoff with fellow American Jason Dufner.

Dufner had trailed Wilson by three shots overnight but clawed them back thanks to a closing 66 to close on 18-under par; carding five birdies without a dropped shot, including two in his last three holes. Wilson, meanwhile did drop a shot at the 11th hole, but added three birdies to his score to also close on the 18-under par mark, 266.

And so it was off to a sudden-death playoff down the 18th hole. Both players shared the honours on the first extra hole with a pair of pars, before Wilson birdied the second extra hole – the 10th – to take the win, with Dufner not able to do better than par.

After play resumed on Monday, Wilson – starting out by completing the 13th hole he had started the previous day – made seven straight pars before holing the winning birdie putt.

Wilson’s win earned him $1,098,000 and catapulted him to the top of the FedEx Cup standings. The win also doubled his pre-2011 career haul of PGA Tour victories, bring the total to four. Wilson had won the Honda Classic in 2007, before capturing the Mayakoba Golf Classic in 2009 and then winning again in Hawaii earlier in the year.

Dufner, meanwhile, remains winless on the PGA Tour since turning professional, although he has won twice on the lesser Nationwide Tour.

Scotland’s Martin Laird shot a closing round of 65 to take a share of third place with veteran Fijian, Vijay Singh, who shot a round of 66.

Meanwhile Nick Watney, JB Holmes and Gary Woodland shared fifth place on 15-under par.

Phil Mickelson, the sole representative left in the tournament for the YGT tipster was in contention at half-way but couldn’t find an extra gear to challenge over the home stretch and played the final 36 holes in level-par to drop into a share of 29th place.

4-way tie at top in delayed Phoenix Open first round

It might have resembled winter golf at the local club to many, but the Waste Management Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale, Arizona finally got underway some four hours later than schedule.

Unseasonably – even freak weather – blighted the normally dry TPC Scottsdale course for a tournament that is usually played in T-shirts, delaying the start due to frosty conditions ; only early starters managed to complete their first rounds, leaving many to complete Friday, weather again permitting.

But with another sharp frost predicted overnight for Friday AM, it appears likely much of the play will roll into Saturday, setting up a potential 36-hole final day, or even a Monday finish.

On the leaderboard, four players shared the lead after the completion of their first rounds; Tom Gillis, Bill Haas, Jason Bohn and veteran Tom Lehman each starting with 6-under par rounds of 65 to lead by one stroke over Chris Couch, Ben Crane and Lucas Glover, who was sporting a new beard – prompting cheers of ‘Grizzly’ from the assembled crowds.

Facial insulation, perhaps, against the cold. “It was cold, and it’s getting colder,” he said after.

A six-way tie also ensued for eighth place on 4-under par; among them was tipster pick and last week’s runner up, Phil Mickelson, who defied the cold by playing his last nine holes in short-sleeves.

“I started to get a little bit warm,” Mickelson said. “It felt great.”

Mickelson, along with Chris Riley, Joe Ogilvie, Jeff Overton, Matt Bettencourt and Dustin Johnson – who reached 4-under par through just five holes before being forced off the course due to fading light.

Afterwards, Mickelson revealed the course played better than expected, despite the weather conditions.
“I expected the golf course to be frozen and balls to be bouncing on the greens quite a ways.” Mickelson said. “It played terrific. The greens were receptive.”

A further eight players tied on 3-under par and a share of 14th place, with Jimmy Walker the only player in that group still to complete.

Bubba Watson, winner of last week’s Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines opened with a 1-under par 70, which included three bogeys in the closing four holes.

Anthony Kim and Ryan Palmer, the remaining pair in the tipster trio for this week were level par and 2-over par respectively, having played through five holes.

Frost delays start of Waste Management Phoenix Open

Frost and Arizona are perhaps two words you won’t often see in the same sentence, but the freak weather that has swept across parts of the United States has forced the PGA Tour to delay the start of the Waste Management Phoenix Open after frost set into the ground, making the course unplayable.

The cold snap has already claimed Wednesday’s Pro-Am event.

Normally, temperatures in the Scottsdale area – which is home to the event’s TPC Scottsale course – are around the 21c mark, but the cold snap has saw the mercury plummet to below freezing.

With play having already been delayed and due to start around 11.40am (EST), the temperature at 7.30am was -3c and has been slow to climb throughout the morning. Indeed, the forecast high for Thursday is only 10c, much like those temperatures that the UK has seen in recent days.

Latest reports from the PGA Tour suggest that the first day’s play will be delayed by at least 3 hours, and cancellation of the first round altogether has not been ruled out with the possibility of a Monday finish.

To add to the chill, the winds are reported to be ranging between 10-20 mph, and with another hard frost forecast overnight, the tournament is clearly facing an uphill battle to keep to schedule if they are to finish on Sunday.

Daly slams Sponsors’ event snubs

‘Wild Thing’ John Daly has launched an attack on two tournaments, stating he won’t consider playing in them again, after the player was overlooked for sponsor exemptions.

Daly hasn’t held a full PGA Tour card since 2006, and has been relying on sponsors invites and his status as a past champion to compete in tournaments, but was overlooked for sponsors’ exemptions for both the Bob Hope Classic and the upcoming Phoenix Open.

Daly hopes to be able to play the minimum 15 Tour events this season, but was less than complimentary about both events to have delivered the snub.

“I’ll tell you this—I’ll never go back to the Hope, and I’ll never go back to Phoenix, no matter what happens,” Daly said. “I won’t even send letters anymore.”

Daly has already played two tournaments via sponsors’ exemptions – the Sony Open, where he missed the cut, and this week’s Farmers Insurance Open in which he opened with a 5-under par 67.

Daly said he was angered by the snubs because the tournaments owed him for his past support.

“I’m just saying that if you look at my past, for 16,17 yeaars I’m sure I’ve done everything they’ve wanted me to do,” Daly said. “I helped celebrities go to the Hope. I went to their parties and did everything for them. That’s the kind of stuff that we all want our young players to do out there to help tournaments, and I felt like I did my part.”

“It hurt me for those two tournaments not to give me spots, so I’ll go to Europe on those weeks.”

Most PGA Tournaments only have four exemption slots to hand out, so it is often a tough choice who should receive them, but Daly has no plans to try to regain his tour card via Q-School; instead happy to continue to compete on exemptions.

“I don’t think right now I need to,” Daly said. “I feel my majors will still hopefully get me in 15 events each year. If not, I’ll think about it. But for me to go to Q-school is just tough. I feel I don’t really need to go that route yet because of the European Tour.”

(via Golf International Magazine)

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